COVINGTON, Ky. (AP) -- Federal officials have spent more than $8 million storing about one million pounds of fireworks seized from a northern Kentucky dealer.

The Kentucky Enquirer (http://bit.ly/OWz80Y ) reports the storage costs continue to rise more than three years after a federal judge ordered the return of nearly half the fireworks. The fireworks are valued at about $1 million.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is paying nearly $102,000 monthly to store 44 tractor loads of fireworks at the former Cornhusker Army Ammunition Plant in Nebraska.

Some of the fireworks may now be unstable because they have not been stored properly for five years, the newspaper reports.

Fallout from the investigation forced the ATF to re-evaluate its practices and led a U.S. magistrate judge to recommend sanctions against the federal government.